The Little Orphan (S)

The Little Orphan is a 1949 American one-reel animated cartoon and is the 40th Tom and Jerry short, released in theatres on April 30, 1949 by Metro-Goldwyn Mayer. It was produced by Fred Quimby and directed by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, with music by Scott Bradley. The cartoon was animated by Irven Spence, Kenneth Muse, Ed Barge and Ray Patterson. The Little Orphan won the 1948 Academy Award for Best Short Subject: Cartoons, this being the fifth Oscar (of seven) given to the cat and mouse team. Though the cartoon was released in 1949, it won its Oscar the previous year. This may have been because it was given a short run at a cinema in 1948 to qualify it for that year's Academy Award. PLOT: The Bide-a-Wee Mouse Home has sent the orphan mouse, Nibbles, to spend Thanksgiving with Jerry. But Jerry's cupboard is bare, and Nibbles is always hungry. They start by raiding Tom's milk dish, but Tom wakes up and drains it. Fortunately, Mammy has just put out a huge Thanksgiving feast, just ready for the raiding. And that's just what Tom and Nibbles do, grabbing Pilgrim hats from the table decorations. All goes fairly well until Nibbles eats a whole orange, which is way too big for him. Jerry smacks him with a spoon, which sends the orange flying, right into Tom's mouth. Tom stalks up to the table in a feather duster, which turns into an Indian headdress. Battle follows, featuring Tom sending flaming cat-tails after the mice, and culminating in a champagne bottle launching Tom into the dish cabinet, which crashes down. Tom waves a white flag, and all three sit down to a polite dinner, but Nibbles eats the whole turkey before anyone else can touch it.